Cultural Awareness

I was doing a Google news search for articles related to street kids and discovered that there’s a new drop in center being planned. It’s location? Lahore, Pakistan. It reminded me once again of the need for cultural awareness training for agencies that work with street-dependent youth. However, I’m not talking about Pakistani, or any other ethnic, culture -- I’m talking about street culture.

When I first wrote my manual describing the culture of the streets, my intention was to develop a training resource for the staff and volunteers of the programs I was running here in Portland. As word got out about the existence of this resource, I started getting orders from places like Seattle, Los Angeles, New York, Boston, and other cities around the nation. I was nervous that the information, based mostly on experiences here in Portland, wouldn’t be applicable to street youth populations in other cities. Then I got really nervous when orders started coming in from places like Canada, Guam, Israel, Norway, South Korea, and Turkey. How could my Portland experience with street youth be in any way applicable to street youth in other nations? It turned out, according to the feedback I received, that all they needed to do was overlook the United States references -- the culture being described was little different from what was being seen on their streets.

Street culture is not national, racial, or ethnic. It is formed when young people voluntarily or involuntarily c0me together to survive outside of traditional supports and social structures. Those traditional supports and structures may look very different around the world, but the culture formed by young people who abandon (or are abandoned by) those supports and structures is remarkably similar.

When I travel around the country presenting on issues related to street culture, I carry with me an article that appeared in my local paper, the Portland Oregonian. I read my audience the title of the article; Shelter serves as lone escape for abused runaways; and the subtitle; Girls fleeing brutal homes find a haven that helps them avoid lives of drugs, crime and prostitution. I then share some selected paragraphs from the article:

For years, (we) chose to ignore the problem of … runaway youth. But as more and more chil­dren have taken to the streets -- and fallen prey to prostitution, crime and addiction … (we’ve) had no choice but to act.

"Divorce, addiction, (and) poverty … are the main causes of runaways," said the 30-year-old manag­er of … the shelter .... "There are par­ents who force their children to steal money for their heroin addic­tion. There are parents who brutal­ly beat their children."

(The shelter houses) 24 girls, ages 12 to 17

Their stories came spilling out, … and they documented some of the social ills … divorce, parental abandonment, addiction, child abuse, unemployment, ...

When finished, I ask if this sounds terribly different from the local programs? Sure, this was in the Oregonian, but could it have been in your local paper describing a program here? Universally, my audiences recognize that there is little difference between this article and what might have appeared in their local papers. That’s when I drop the bomb and let them know that I’ve lied to them -- but just a little. Everything I’ve said is true; the article appeared in the Oregonian and the quotes are accurate. My only deceit was the title of the article -- I left out a word. The real title is; Shelter serves as lone escape for abused Iranian runaways. While the article appeared in the Oregonian, the program being described is located in Tehran, Iran; a fundamentalist Islamic republic that could not be more culturally different from the United States if it tried. But when young people find themselves in the position of surviving outside of adult guidance and support, the culture formed in Tehran is very similar to the culture formed in Portland, and the services required mirror those required anywhere else. Thus you see shelter programs in Tehran, and drop in centers in Lahore.

Despite all of this, most cross-cultural training I see in youth programs is related to racial and ethnic culture, with street culture largely ignored in terms of a specialized training focus. Ignored, or delegated to having a copy of my manual laying around -- highly recommended, of course, but a 9-year-old manual ready for an update is hardly a substitute for an integrated focus on working cross-culturally with street-dependent young people. If such an integrated focus does not exist within your organization, you’re services are probably going to be less effective than they could be.